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Meet the team! |
Principal Investigator
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PABLO RIPOLLÉS
Pablo Ripollés is an Assistant Professor with a joint position between the Department of Psychology and the Music and Audio Research Laboratory (MARL) at New York University. He serves as MARL's associate director since September 2020. He received a B.M. in Computer Engineering from University of València (2009), an MSc in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Navarra (2011), and a PhD in Biomedicine from the University of Barcelona (2016). Dr. Ripollés work relies on creating a joint theoretical framework to study language, reward, memory and music with a clear objective: capitalize on music to shape cognition, and capitalize on cognition to shape music. CV | google scholar | Twitter | Email |
Lab Manager
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MICHAEL McPHEE
Michael McPhee is a Junior Research Scientist and Lab Manager at New York University. He received a B.A. in Biology, Neuroscience, and Cognitive Science from Williams College (2015) and has been working with Dr. Ripollés from the lab's early days. Before coming to NYU, Michael was a research assistant in the Freiwald Lab at Rockefeller University and in the Maroja Lab at Williams College. Michael is interested in studying musical experience as the intersection of reward learning, social cognition, and neuroaesthetics, in visual-social cognition, and in philosophy of mind. |
Graduate Student
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ELLIE BEAN ABRAMS
Ellie Bean Abrams is a PhD student in NYU’s Cognition and Perception program working under the supervision of Pablo Ripollés and David Poeppel. Before starting her PhD, Ellie worked at NYU’s Neuroscience of Language lab, where she investigated basic linguistic processing in the child brain using MEG. Previously she studied cognitive science and music at Pomona College. Ellie’s research explores the musical experience, beginning at the moment the brain extracts a perceived pitch from a musical stimulus and ending at the experience of individualized musical pleasure. More broadly, she uses music, an abstract stimulus, to study the interaction between human memory and reward using behavioral, neural, and computational techniques. She is also interested in the speech-music interface and the encoding of lower- and higher-order musical features. CV | Email |
Graduate Student
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ELENA GEORGIEVA
Elena Georgieva is a PhD student at NYU's Music and Audio Research Lab (MARL) working with Dr. Pablo Ripollés and Dr. Brian McFee. Before coming to NYU, Elena taught sound recording at Stanford University's Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA), where she received her master’s degree in 2019. Elena is a singer and vocal producer and performs with several singing groups! Elena is interested in studying how people interact with music in their everyday lives and how technology can enhance those interactions. Broadly, she does music, psychology, and machine learning. Email | Website |
Graduate Student
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MICHAL GOLDSTEIN
Michal Goldstein is a PhD student in the Department of Music Technology and the Music and Audio Research Laboratory (MARL) at New York University. Her advisors are Mary Farbood (MARL) and Pablo Ripollés (MARL/Psychology). She received a B.A. in Musicology and Psychology (2016), and an M.A in Musicology and Cognitive Sciences (2019) from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Michal is interested in the intersection between music theory and perception, and in using the experience of music listening in order to better understand the brain. |
Graduate Student
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ANNA PALUMBO
Anna Palumbo is a PhD candidate in the Rehabilitation Science Program at NYU, where she works with Dr. Pablo Ripollés in the Music and Auditory Research Laboratory (MARL) and Dr. Gerald Voelbel in the Department of Occupational Therapy. She also collaborates on research initiatives with Dr. Alan Turry at the Nordoff-Robbins Center for Music Therapy. Before beginning her doctoral studies, Anna received her master’s degree in music therapy from NYU. As a music therapist, she worked with adults with neurodegenerative disease, acquired brain injury and mental illness, as well as autistic people and other neurodiverse populations. |
Graduate Student
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BRANDON CARONE
Brandon Carone is a PhD student in NYU’s Cognition and Perception program working with Dr. Pablo Ripollés. His research focuses primarily on the cognitive neuroscience of music, memory, and reward, and he is interested in studying the effects of music on cognitive and emotional development, the neural substrates of musical pleasure and spontaneous musical performance, and the use of musical tools to combat neurodegenerative disease. Brandon received his B.S. in Cognitive Science from UCLA, where he studied memory and cognition across the lifespan, and how music and memory processes interact in the brain. After graduating, he conducted clinical and developmental research at UCSD in studies that utilized a range of neuroimaging modalities alongside neuropsychological, clinical, and neurosensory assessments. Beyond academia, Brandon is a multi-instrumentalist who has been composing music for most of his life, and he has worked closely with the Music Mends Minds and Music & Memory non-profit organizations. |
Research Assistant
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RICHA NAMBALLA
Richa Namballa is a Master’s student in NYU’s Music Technology program. Her current research in the Ripollés Lab concerns the improvement of the Computer Human Interface for the Live Labeling of Emotional Responses (CHILLER) for goosebump detection. She is completing her thesis on the analysis of vocal timbre in the popular music of different cultures under the supervision of Dr. Brian McFee and Dr. Leila Adu-Gilmore. Prior to pursuing her graduate studies, Richa received a B.A. in Statistics and a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of California, Berkeley. Upon graduation, she worked for five years in Silicon Valley as a data scientist in enterprise procurement software. Richa’s other research interests include music information retrieval, digital signal processing, algorithmic composition, and music production. |
Research Assistant
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EVA LUNA MUÑOZ VIDAL
Eva Luna Muñoz Vidal is an Assistant Research Scientist at New York University. She received a B.S. in Human and Animal Biotechnology from Polytechnic University of Valencia (2020) and is currently finishing a M.S. in Behavioral and Cognitive Neuroscience at Sorbonne University. In parallel with her scientific studies, Eva Luna has always been interested in music and learnt violin performance at the Professional Conservatory of Music of Valencia where she received a Professional Music Diploma in 2018. She is particularly interested in research projects merging both of her two big passions, brain and music, in order to decipher the emotional coding triggered by music in the nervous system or the development of music as a therapeutic and rehabilitation tool to treat neurodegenerative and psychiatric disorders. |
